Why are college-educated young people so stupid and gullible?

[Anonymous]

You'd think going to college would give young minds the ability to see reason and think for themselves, but it seems like it's doing the exact opposite. How are the young people who plan on becoming future doctors, lawyers, teachers, and psychologists the same ones that believe everything they see online and take it to heart?

[WindAtMyBack]

Case in point. The people answering this question all assume that it's true - without knowing if it's actually true. We see this here on GaG every day.

OK, so it "seems" like young people and college educated people are stupid and gullible. But "seems like" doesn't get you very far. "Seems like" is only a starting point. The first step shouldn't be to answer the question, as if it's true. The first step should be to do a query.

I can't objectively compare to when I was young. Because I was young then myself, and now I'm not. It's not possible for me to do a fair comparison because my perspective has changed so dramatically.

All young people are gullible and stupid. And all young people will get older and look back at when they were young, and agree that it's true.

I'll pretend it's true that young people today are more gullible and stupid than in the past - even though I question if it's true.

Some math. Approximately 2/3 of young people today (in the US) go to college. It's actually gone down a little, but I'm sticking with 2/3 because it's a round number. That's considerably higher than when I first went to college. If half the population are above average intelligence, and half below, what can you conclude? You can conclude that you don't have to be smart to go to college. It's a myth.

When you look at majors, as the number of college students increase, the percentage of STEM majors has decreased. There are a lot of majors considered STEM. Biology is the only one that increased, all the rest went down. A large portion of the increased number of students have majors that we used to call "basket weaving".

General education requirements have changed also. I went to college off and on for 20 years. I watched it happen. It's changed even more since I last went. The GEs have shifted toward more subjective topics. Subjective is fine, as long as it's being taught as subjective. But more and more it's being taught as factual.

Student should be taught skepticism. Skepticism is an important part of rational thought, science, and every day life. It's at the very core of science. You could call skepticism the opposite of gullibility. If students are taught subjective topics as if they are factual, that is not good for the students.

Then there is the Internet, which probably should have been first. How can you be properly skeptical when you have a dozen hyper links staring you in the face? Instead of thinking about and truly absorbing what you just read, click. It's information overload without properly absorbing what you read.

You completely lose focus, because you are constantly on to the next thing. When are you going to insert proper skepticism and think about what you've read? There is no time for it between clicks and texts.

[loveslongnails]

This question is asked AS IF the educational system of the USA is designed to produce "critical thinkers". News flash; it's not! You aren't even told the truth about history in the classroom. Math and science is discouraged for women and minorities also so the "best and brightest" are coming from other countries. (So what does Orange Julius Caesar decide to try and do? $100k tax PER PERSON on companies hiring those particular folks. Obviously, that will automatically make USA graduates smarter, won't it? LOL)

Picture for a moment going to grade school and high school in a red state, where virtually every controversial book or book designed to make you think is banned. The next generation won't even know what books they were (that's the plan). Imagine getting to the college level having only read the stuff you're indoctrinated and groomed to accept (that's the plan).

Uneducated people are the easiest to manipulate, hence... magats.

[Liyue]

The amount of information in modern society is immense, especially with the internet, which provides easy access to a wide variety of information. Often, young people struggle to quickly sift through this flood of information to find useful and factual content. Lacking sufficient experience and mature judgment, they are easily misled by false information or erroneous views.

Even though university education fosters critical thinking, many young people may not fully grasp how to effectively filter and judge information in this era of information overload.

[Apulu_backagain]

They don't, at least not in my country. In my country, the good government college knocks out every bit of innocence and stupidity left.

The problem is that very less percentage of our population studies in those types of prestigious colleges because they're more competitive than ivy leagues.

American education system has to improve a ton. They have dumbed down over the years instead of being more academically rigorous as years go by.

[exitseven]

College does not prepare students for life the way it used to. Time management used to be one of the most important skills that you developed in college. if you did not spend enough time studying you did not pass the course. If you did not pass the course they kicked you out.
Now colleges have "retention counselors" that help failing students get on track, They find them tutors and follow them until they finally graduate.
I think colleges also havew dumbed down the curriculum in response to the failing public school system.

[lightbulb27]

They are not trained to think but told what to think and more importantly over life... how to feel.

remember that children believe in santa clause and a bunny rabbit. they cannot differentiate what is true, they just absorb it... so they are programmable. A lot of what people "know" is programmed emotionally at a young age.

People want to have the right answer, be safe in the crowd or they go the other way and rebel.

[Chazmatazz269]

The democrats have invested billions into controlling the minds of young people whose parents couldn’t afford better education.
That was complete, up to and including college education in the US. This is also the true reason behind Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
Millions of people say and do things that liberals disagree with, every day, all the time. Nobody has been murdered over it publicly. Kirk was publicly assassinated for challenging the democrats’ power structure.

[Danzigdawson]

😆 Goddamn do you live in your own little world.

[ProbablyClueless]

They have money, free time, and just enough knowledge/awareness to see the injustice of the world without also understanding that there tends to be a reason reality works out the way it does.

Empathy and feeling like a good person is a powerful and seductive drug.

[Syntosi]

You mean, as opposed to "normal" people who keep believing in stuff like flat earth, magic sky daddy and one-world government conspiracies?

Humans are gullible, collage-educated people less so.

[jshm2]

Because being "educated" does not equate to being "clever". Those are two very different things.

Some of the dumbest people alive were highly educated.

[DrPepper12]

Poor media literacy skills

Ego & validation quest

A society that Infantasizes & similarly worships youth

NONE of that is college specific. They're all fucked up!

[Anonymous]

the funny thing is they think they're smarter than everyone else with no results to show for their worthless piece of paper

[mysteriousNicholas]

And as folks have been saying for decades "college (uni) isn't for everyone"

[shortster]

The education system isn't about teaching people; it is about keeping them out of the workforce until they are older for the purposes of keeping the unemployment number low.

[FunkyMonkee]

I know!! They think they're SO SMART!! They're IN SCHOOL!! SOMETHING ain't together!!

[Staximus]

Because they can't separate idealism with reality.

[seeyounexttuesday]

They're taught what to think, not how to think. We've known this for decades.

[chenyu]

Brainwashed by capital and turned into a tool

[FateofOphelia]

They are brainwashed

[Anonymous]

Who says